


160. ophelia

by piggy09



Series: The Sestre Daily Drabble Project [211]
Category: Orphan Black (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe - High School, Gen, Where is the high school theatre AU tag we need and deserve
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-01-27
Updated: 2017-01-27
Packaged: 2018-09-20 05:17:22
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,251
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9477239
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/piggy09/pseuds/piggy09
Summary: Sarah skids into the auditorium at ninety miles an hour, throws herself into the lighting booth and ducks and then realizes, abruptly, that there’s an actual rehearsal going on. She didn’t even know there was a play coming up – and you have to work hard to have that level of ignorance, because Alison Hendrix neverevershuts up about drama club. But Sarah has managed to avoid any sort of information. She used to be proud of that. Now she feels like she’s being punished for it.





	

The lighting booth in the auditorium of Sarah’s high school is small, and smells like teenage sweat. She found out about it in her sophomore year – people come here to ditch class, sometimes, because the auditorium is never locked and the lighting booth is never locked.

Her needs this time around are slightly more desperate.

Sarah skids into the auditorium at ninety miles an hour, throws herself into the lighting booth and ducks and then realizes, abruptly, that there’s an actual rehearsal going on. She didn’t even know there _was_ a play coming up – and you have to work hard to have that level of ignorance, because Alison Hendrix never _ever_ shuts up about drama club. But Sarah has managed to avoid any sort of information. She used to be proud of that. Now she feels like she’s being punished for it.

She hears someone distantly monologuing about owls and baker’s daughters, and leans backward to let her head _thunk_ against the wall. She is going to be stuck here for the next hour, listening to one of Alison’s terrible friends do their terrible dialogue, and—

“Ow,” says a voice sympathetically, when Sarah’s skull hits the wall. Sarah panics and somehow manages a full-body jazzhands, spasming in terror and looking up.

Oh god, there is someone in the lighting booth.

Someone is doing _lighting_. For this _rehearsal_. Sarah is an idiot.

On the plus side: it’s not Alison Hendrix, or any of Alison’s posse of gossipy blondes. It’s just Helena, that transfer student who showed up a year or so ago and has been dejectedly trailing after Alison and her posse of gossipy blondes ever since. Sarah has never actually had a conversation with her.

“Listen,” she hisses urgently, “I’m not here, alright? I was never here.”

“You are here,” says Helena slowly. “I can see you.”

Sarah is about to answer when she hears the auditorium door open. She scrunches even lower. There is the very distinctive sound of Rachel Duncan limping her way into the auditorium. Her prosthetic eye probably can’t see through walls, right? Right? That seems like something Rachel shouldn’t be able to do. Sarah lowers herself even further, until she is lying on the floor. She slants her eyes over to Helena and sees Helena biting her lip, hard, and chortling through it anyways.

“You are funny,” she says, very loudly.

“Helena,” Sarah hisses, “hey, hi, listen. Rachel is going to bloody murder me. She’s gonna get blood all over your—” she scopes out the booth, sees nothing she recognizes, rolls with it, “—switches and dials and shit, and – you’re gonna have to watch me get murdered. She _can’t know I’m here_ , alright?”

“Okay,” Helena says in an overloud whisper. She seems thrilled to be involved in the subterfuge. Sarah holds her breath as Helena does some fiddling with the dials and the knobs. _Come on,_ Sarah thinks, _come on, you horrible bitch_. Theatre should be a natural Rachel Duncan repellant – and sure enough, there’s the sound of her footsteps retreating. The door closes.

“She left,” Helena hisses. Stage whisper, ha. Sarah sits up.

“Cheers,” she says shakily, running a hand through her hair. “Think you saved my bloody life.”

“I have never saved a life before,” Helena says, and then from onstage there’s Alison’s high entreaties of _Helena? Helena?_ and Helena makes a sour face and says “yes” into the microphone. Sarah debates the merits of peeping through the lighting booth’s window, realizes Alison would absolutely sell her out to Rachel for _tainting_ the _sacred space_ of the _theatre_ , and morosely keeps her huddle on the ground. Helena turns some knobs. Then she turns them the other way. Then she flicks a few switches. Then she seemingly gets bored, and looks back at Sarah.

“Why were you running away from Rachel,” Helena says.

“Best if we don’t get into it,” Sarah says.

Helena’s mouth tilts down at the corner and she twists another dial. From the stage there is a reedy shriek and Helena starts, hastily twists it the other way.

“What time does rehearsal end, anyway,” Sarah says.

“At six,” Helena says sadly.

“ _No_ ,” Sarah says. It’s 2:45. No _way_.

“Yes,” Helena says. “I bring snacks.” She points at her backpack on the ground, and nods encouragingly for Sarah to open it. Six different kinds of candy spill out when she pulls the zipper a little bit; the backpack is full to bursting.

“…smart,” she says, because what else do you say to that. “No offense, but why’re you – doing this?”

Helena shrugs a shoulder. “Alison said.”

Sarah snorts. “Alison says a lot of shit, yeah? You don’t have to _listen_ to it.”

“You do not listen,” Helena points out, “and now you are trapped in the lights room.”

“So’re you.”

Helena blinks. “Oh. Yes.” She toggles a switch a few times; Sarah assumes by the lack of Alison-yelling that it isn’t doing anything much. Helena looks like she’s wrestling with something. Sarah desperately hopes it isn’t an attempt at a heart-to-heart, because if it is she’s leaping out of this lighting booth and taking her chances on Alison’s (probably nonexistent) mercy.

“I can turn all the lights out,” Helena blurts. “And then you can leave. In the black.”

“Oh, shit,” Sarah says, scrambling to sit upright, “you’d do that? I mean – yeah, that’d be great, thanks. I can’t leave ‘til the uber-bitch has finished her patrol, but _god_ I’d really like to get out of here.”

Helena nods to herself, splaying her hand familiarly over a whole row of bright red switches. “Also,” she says. “Um. If you are running from Rachel another day, and you need someplace to go, you can go here. There are snacks. And. Yes.” She stops. Part of Sarah is filing this away to tell Cosima later, but part of her just feels sad.

“Thanks,” she says, and finds she means it. “And – hey, if you ever get sick of Alison’s shite, you can sit with us at lunch. Or something. I dunno.” She regrets it the second it’s out of her mouth, but it’s too late to take it back: Helena’s face is transparently grateful, and you can’t say _haha never mind_ to a face like that.

“Okay,” Helena says, word stumbling out of her mouth.

“Great,” Sarah says with a bit of a seasick smirk. Helena looks back out the lighting booth window.

“Alison isn’t bad,” she says hesitantly. “She is just scared. It makes her mean. But she does not mean to hurt people.” She turns back and looks at Sarah. “So…not Rachel.”

“Yeah, figured,” Sarah says quietly, folding her knees to her chest and resting her arms on them. She can’t wait to stand up. One of her legs starts bouncing without her say-so.

“Helena?” calls Alison from the stage, and Helena makes a loud fart noise and then turns on the microphone. “Yes,” she says. Sarah flips open her phone and checks it. A bunch of missed texts from Cosima, Felix, Tony – _where are you, what the hell, why does Rachel look like she’s going to murder somebody_.

_I’m fine_ , she texts back, and closes her phone. For some reason she doesn’t want to tell them about it. Not because it’s embarrassing – being rescued by the school’s resident weirdo – but for a reason she doesn’t really know.

Helena looks at her on the floor and tosses her a smile, hesitant and awkward. Sarah smiles back. It is, to her surprise, easy.

**Author's Note:**

> Thanks for reading! Please kudos + comment if you enjoyed, and please excuse my complete lack of lighting knowledge. And then they hit a switch? I think? I did some theatre lighting in high school, and yet it still remains a COMPLETE mystery to me.


End file.
